EOS C400 support for XF-AVC in 6K

[BennyBlack]

This may be a silly ask but is there a reason why the c400 camera does not support 6k XF-AVC format? From what I know the XF-AVC codec is proprietary to Canon so they could easily give this camera the capability. I work primarily with a client who prefers not to film raw, but I like the 6k feature of this camera but it is drawback for me that I can't get 6k in XF-AVC codec.

[AtticusLake]

XF-AVC may be "proprietary", in some sense, but it's still an industry standard; because editing software (NLEs) has to understand it.  If Canon started arbitrarily changing the format, editors like Resolve and Premiere would no longer be able to load your videos.

BTW, XF-AVC isn't a codec; it's a container format.  The actual video is encoded in H.264, but using a subset of H.264 specified by XF-AVC.

[AtticusLake]

BTW again, I don't have a C400, but isn't the 4k video oversampled from 6k?

In other words, because "6k" means 6k photosites, not 6k pixels, a "6k" sensor doesn't actually give you 6k pixel resolution; it's going to be more like 3-4k.  But if you do a high-quality downscale to 4k, then you get something like a genuine 4k pixel resolution -- in other words, basically all the benefits of a 6k photosite sensor, but in a 4k video format.

So have you tried actually testing the amount of detail you get in 4k and comparing it to the 6k?

[keylanh]

While this is a helpful explanation of what XF AVC is as a video format, it does not answer the question at hand. Why would there not be a way to film in the resolution of 6000 x 3170 in any compressed file format? Seems like a massive missed opportunity for something that should be relatively simple to implement? 

Some users may want the added flexibility to down sample in post or to reframe / stabilize. 

Hopefully this is added in a future firmware update and hopefully that update comes soon. 

[AtticusLake]

Well, I did explain that.  XF-AVC is defined to be 4k.  If Canon made a camera that recorded a different flavour of XF-AVC, then no existing software would be able to read it.  While you are of course right that it would be technically possible, there's no point in recording video that no software can load.